Toy glider planes are known in the art. Typical glider planes are comprised of a lightweight material to facilitate loft. Although these materials are useful from a weight-to-lift standpoint, they are often fragile. Repeated impact with surfaces, and rough use easily damages most materials that comprise glider planes. Therefore there is a need for an improved glider plane made from a material that is impervious to, or resists creasing and tearing, and which, when deformed, resumes its original shape to preserve its flight characteristics.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,139,392 to Walker, et al. discloses a glider toy comprising a series of depressions on the bottom surface for receiving the fingers of a user and a series of additional receptacles for weights to affect the flight of the craft. This references is not drawn to an improvement in the construction of the plane.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,026,313 to Meyer discloses a model airplane made of foamed plastics, comprising rigid stabilizing surfaces and wings provided with a catapulting hook, and a sweptback wing profile with a large sweepback and decreasing thickness and depth from the wing root at the fuselage tips to the tips of the wing. Although this model airplane is comprised of a foamed plastic, this material is brittle and will not resume its shape when deformed.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,655,720 to Reneger et al. discloses a toy glider having a rigid spine member with transversely extending connector portions configured for receiving the wings therein. The wings are separable from the spine member on impact, and are connected to a means for maintaining each wing in a folded configuration. Although this invention is designed to survive impacts, it does so by virtue of a break-away mechanism rather than by virtue of the nature of the material comprising the plane.
Therefore there is a need for a toy glider plane that can be deformed either by a user or other external force, or by the impact of the plane with a stationary object, wherein the plane regains its shape when released or after impact. A further object of the invention is to provide a folded toy glider plane comprised of a material that can be creased under a certain pressure to form its shape, but which can be mutilated under pressures less than the creasing pressure and regain its shape. These and other objects of the present invention will become clear from the following description, drawings and claims.